Communications

The Annenberg Public Policy Center’s Kathleen Hall Jamieson joined a panel of experts on “Morning Joe” for a discussion about allegations of Russian interference in the 2016 election. She identified “trolls, hackers, and disinformation to [James] Comey” as major factors in Trump’s win.

The Annenberg Public Policy Center’s Kathleen Hall Jamieson was featured for her new book, “Cyberwar: How Russian Hackers and Trolls Helped Elect a President.” Though she had initially been “actively skeptical,” Jamieson said, she eventually concluded that the data clearly supported claims of Russian meddling.

Emily Hund, a doctoral candidate in the Annenberg School for Communication, discussed retailers’ attempts harness the power of influencers to attract customers. The approach, she said, “seems like a new height in the social media-fashion feedback loop.”

Kathleen Hall Jamieson of the Annenberg Public Policy Center commented on Brett Kavanaugh’s testimony, saying that “it is unusual to see a middle aged professional —male or female—experience the range of emotions in public in a formal setting expressed by Judge Kavanaugh.… We expect judges to sound and seem dispassionate.”

Annenberg School for Communication postdoc Rosemary Clark-Parsons discussed “hashtag hijacking” on social media. “Over the past several years, we’ve seen activists across the political spectrum use this tactic, including Black Lives Matter activists’ hijacking of the #MyNYPD hashtag and now men’s rights activists’ hijacking of #HimToo to spread rape myths about false accusations,” she said.

Emily Falk of the Annenberg School for Communication spoke about self-transcendence and behavior modification. “If you let people first ‘zoom out’ and think about the things and people that matter most to them,” said Falk, “then they see that their self-concept and self-worth aren't tied to this particular behavior–in this case, their lack of physical activity.”

Kathleen Hall Jamieson of the Annenberg Public Policy Center was featured for her new book, Cyberwar: How Russian Hackers and Trolls Helped Elect a President—What We Don’t, Can’t, and Do Know. “I’m not arguing that Russians pulled the voting levers,” she said. “I’m arguing that they persuaded enough people to either vote a certain way or not vote at all.”

The Annenberg School for Communication’s Victor Pickard discussed conservative news channel Newsmax and its recent deal with Comcast. If Comcast is “feeling the heat from the right, it will make sense to appease some of those critics,” said Pickard.